Over the last five years that I’ve worked in the Middle East, though, I never had a run-in with Danny. He never called to complain about our coverage and always made sure that our work visas and temporary press cards were quickly approved.

But now Danny can pop the champagne.

This week brings an end to Checkpoint Jerusalem.

As readers will have noticed, I’m heading to Kabul, where McClatchy is in the process of opening up a full-time bureau so we can better cover Afghanistan in the years ahead.

In my stead, McClatchy will be bringing you coverage from two of the most talented reporters in Jerusalem.

First, McClatchy is expanding its joint venture with The Christian Science Monitor so that readers will be able to read the work of Ilene Prusher, one of the most thoughtful veterans in Jerusalem.

But, for the first time in decades, McClatchy will no longer have a full-time bureau in Jerusalem.

In fact, McClatchy has become the last American news organization to close up shop in Beit Agron, the boxy press building that long-served as Jerusalem's media hub.

For decades, as I've written before, the fourth floor of Beit Agron was coveted real estate. Journalists waited for months and years to get space on the fourth floor.

Now the hall is deserted.

In last five years, I have watched office after office close. Newsday. The Boston Globe. The Baltimore Sun. The Toronto Star. The Chicago Tribune. And, now, McClatchy.

In troubled financial times, McClatchy has held out longer than most newspaper companies in retaining its international coverage.

Over the past four years, I've covered the Israel-Hezbollah war, Saudi sitcoms, elections in Lebanon, Obama's speech to the Muslim world, Palestinian drag queens, and Israeli politics.

But the years have largely been dominated by events in Gaza.

I took over the bureau (back then it was Knight Ridder) a few weeks before Israel pulled out of Gaza in the summer of 2005.

This blog began right before the Hamas military takeover of the Gaza Strip in June, 2007. Because Israel barred reporters from entering Gaza as the fighting intensified, I was one of the few international reporters to be inside to cover the chaos as it unfolded.

This blog devoted many posts to challenging Israel's decision to bar reporters from entering Gaza during last winter's offensive. And I was one of the many reporters to trek through the Egyptian desert to enter Gaza as Israeli forces pulled out last January.

While Danny derided reporters who ventured into Gaza to report on the fighting as a "disgrace to their profession," journalists from McClatchy, NPR, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Times of London, The Independent, The Washington Post, The New York Times and other major news outlets spent weeks trying to separate fact from fiction, reality from propaganda.

Journalists spent hours interviewing survivors and testing their credibility. Reporters dug up medical records to verify claims, conducted separate interviews with witnesses, scoured neighborhoods for information, conferred with human rights researchers working in Gaza, examined the scenes of fighting, challenged inconsistencies in stories, and sought input from the Israeli military.

McClatchy reported on allegations that Israeli soldiers shot Palestinian civilians waving white flags and used Palestinian men as human shields. McClatchy wrote about Hamas using the fighting as cover to attack its Fatah rivals and about Israel's attack on the American school in Gaza.

While the stories were vociferously challenged by the Israeli officials, the Israeli government eventually, reluctantly, agreed to look into the most inflammatory allegations.

And the United Nations has warned both Israel and Hamas that they could face war crimes charges if they don't launch serious, credible investigations of their conduct during the fighting.

The coverage that led to the UN actions was possible because so many international news outlets devoted time, money and resources to the story.

Jerusalem is still home to one of the biggest concentrations of reporters in the world. But the number of full-time journalists based in the Middle East is dwindling.

And that will make it harder for all of us to separate truth from fiction in this convoluted, politically-charged part of the world.

Checkpoint Jerusalem will soon be morphing into Checkpoint Kabul. There, as here, I hope to use the blog to report on both the substantive and the surreal.

Taliban white flags don't mean surrender

(McClatchy photo: Chuck Liddy. An Afghan man listens to a US soldier at a checkpoint in southern Afghanistan.)

One of the biggest challenges facing President Obama in Afghanistan is the drive to train enough Afghan police and soldiers to handle the fight when US forces leave.

McClatchy's Jay Price and Chuck Liddy have been out to see how the training is going.

"Eight years after the U.S.-led invasion," Jay writes, " the police appear to be years away from functioning independently. American trainers say they must tell the Afghans repeatedly to do the simplest things, such as separating passengers they've searched from ones they haven't when they stop a vehicle."

Jay and Chuck spent time at a checkpoint in southern Afghanistan where the Taliban marked their territory with white flags and the Afghan soldiers abandoned their post after the American troops left.

As she flew to Kabul for Karzai's swearing-in ceremony, Clinton told reporters that the Afghan president's alliance with Dostum "certainly raises questions."

Sitting in the hall with Dostum was one thing.

Now, it turns out, Clinton came dangerously close to inadvertently taking part in a photo op with Dostum at the palace.

After Karzai was sworn-in and dignitaries were chatting in the palace hall, Dostum was among those shaking hands with visitors and making his way towards Clinton to say hello.

A picture of Clinton and Dostum shaking hands would have been an unacceptable PR fumble on a day when the Obama administration was sending out positive messages about Karzai and looking for ways to repair the strained relationships.

As Dostum closed in, according to one witness, US diplomat Richard Holbrooke made a move towards Clinton in an apparent attempt to warn her that she was about to shake hands with the notorious warlord.

Clinton's security team deftly moved in and made sure that Clinton wrapped up her handshakes just as Dostum was sauntering up to say hello, according to the source in the room.

After the inauguration, Clinton sought to draw distinctions between good warlords and bad warlords.

"There are people who are called back who fought on behalf of the people of Afghanistan against the Soviet Union, who fought against al-Qaida and the Taliban and their allies," Clinton said."And there are people who had very serious breaches of human rights and mistreatment of people during war, which is always difficult to look back on and figure out how to judge."

Dostum held a key military post in Karzai's last government. But few people in Kabul expect him to be given a prominent role in the next cabinet. Instead, Dostum allies are more likely to be rewarded with political posts as Karzai creates his new team.

Progress in Israeli-Palestinian (small) talks

"According to State Department officials, the violently clashing peoples of Israel and Palestine have agreed to resume small talks this week in an effort to move toward eventually having a discussion about the weather," according to the report.

Saudi "Super Bad" sitcom's debut

Earlier this year, I wrote about a Quixotic attempt by some aspiring filmmakers in Riyadh who are trying to produce a pioneering Saudi "Super Bad" sitcom about four guys from Riyadh trying to start a band.